Bantama: Macho men besiege markets, public toilets

Some macho men at Bantama, Kumasi, in the Ashanti Region, reportedly supporters of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), took control of some markets and public toilets seizing revenue collected by the Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly attendants on Monday.

They claimed they had moved in to prevent the revenue collectors from stealing the money.

This incident mirrors some others across the country where suspected NPP members have raided and vandalized government installations, like most recently in Bodi in the Western Region, where they besieged and locked up the office of the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) in the area on Monday.

One of the KMA revenue collectors who spoke to Citi News said they had tried to reason with rampaging men but to no avail.

“They say their party is now in power so they attacked us and took all the revenue we collected. Even when we asked them to come to the office with us, they didn’t listen,” the man lamented.

“We told them we are with the KMA so if anything at all, we take instruction from the office. If our bosses sack us from our post we have no problem, but we haven’t heard any such thing only for them to assault us and make away with the revenue we had collected all in the name of our government is now in power,”

The macho men also made sure their voices were heard and said were only ensuring proper accountability of the revenue collected.

“As it stands now, we have been asked to send everything to the office so we are taking everything there. We are told not to handle the money. God willing we will come and take the money. We are taking all the money and the tickets to see if they tally. If we are lackadaisical about it, there is no way things will work out.”

“We are taking what belongs to us like the youth employment and NADMO. We will go and sack the appointees. I went there around 6 in the morning and they were doing nothing.”

There have been some reports that the Macho men said they were acting on the orders of the NPP’s Ashanti Regional Youth Organizer, Shaibu Bamabu.